Exposed :: Types of Fingerprints

On the above post, you can see the different fingerprint patterns and their names. But when I say "types" of fingerprints, I mean the actual visible spectrum of the fingerprints at a crime scene. There are three different types of fingerprints, latent, patent, and plastic.

Latent: Latent fingerprints are the hardest to see and find on the crime scene. The word latent means hidden or invisible. The latent prints are usually created when sweat covers an area of the body, whether a fingertip, hand, foot, etc, and the sweaty area brushes a surface such as a table or a wall. Latent fingerprints will usually be lifted and brought back to the lab or headquarters for further investigation.

Patent: Patent fingerprints are usually considered the easiest to see and find on the crime scene. Patent fingerprints are usually created when substances such as dirt, paint, blood, and so on are present on an area of the body. When that area, whether a hand, fingertip, foot, etc, brushes or even touches a surface such as a table, wall, floor, or counter, it will leave some sort of mark that should be easy to identify. Instead of lifting the print as they would with latent fingerprints, they would usually just take a picture of it and bring it back to headquarters for identification.

Plastic: A plastic print is a print left on an imprintable substance such as wax, putty, and grease. They aren't too hard to see once it's there in front of you, but finding them would probably take some time. The substance that the plastic print was left on would be taken back to the lab or headquarters to be further investigated.